Friday, January 11, 2013

Half Square Triangle Table Runner: Finished

I finished the half square triangle table runner for my sister-in-law. It measures 15" x 51" and is made of up six different prints and a neutral solid cotton.

When I was cutting the squares to make up the 3" half square triangles, I forgot that each square makes two half square triangles, so now I have enough blocks to make two table runners.

I quilted it using straight stitch 1/4" on both sides of the horizontal and vertical seam lines.

I tried something new by machine sewing the binding. I typical machine sew the top side and hand sew the back side, but I've always wanted to try machine sewing it since it is faster. This was a great project to try it out since not many people pay attention to the back side of a table runner. I referred to this great tutorial from Red Pepper Quilts.

I used 2-3/8" binding strips because this was my first time doing it this way and I wanted to make sure I caught the back side. I think on my second table runner, I will use 2-1/4" strips to get the stitches closer to the edge. I'm not 100% sold on this method just yet for my quilts because I like the concealed and clean look of hand stitiching. Perhaps I will feel different as I practice more, but I am glad I tried it.

5 comments:

Beautiful! Love the colors and your binding turned out nice. looks like you have not washed it yet? I do find that I am happier with the machine binding after washing it, the varriances look less noticable then.

I really love the way you quilted this. I want to do this on a project. The colors are great, too. Your binding looks fine for this, but I know what you mean. I use a blind stitch for mine. I'll probably do a tutorial on my blog in a few weeks if you want to see.

It's lovely, Stacy! I love that you have enough to make 2 runners. :) machine binding DOES get easier....and even if you don't use it for binding everything you make, it's a nice trick to pull out of your back pocket when needed.

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